He lost on points to the future WBA junior flyweight champion Hwan-Jin Kim in August of that year.
On January 3, 1980, Nakajima fought against Kim Sung-Jun for the WBC junior flyweight title at the Korakuen Hall.
The gym's president Kenji Yonekura made him move to an apartment near his residence, and woke him up every morning to make him do his roadwork.
[3][4] Yet Nakajima was stopped in the eleventh round of the rematch with Zapata for that title at the Civic Center in Gifu city in September of the same year.
Nakajima once serves as the president of the golf course development company, and currently acts as the executive secretary of the Pro Boxing World Champions party which is the internal organization of the Japan Pro Boxing Association (JPBA) consisting of Japan's world champions for the social contributions.